Yesterday the inquest heard how two passengers had told of "rough rides" on journeys the previous night as they approached Potters Bar station in Herts.

Terence Moore, a King's Cross platform announcer, was travelling home from work at around 9pm on a train that was "jolting from left to right".

He told ticket office staffer Derek Jackson when he got off at Stevenage. But assistant deputy coroner Judge Michael Findlay Baker, QC, said: "He did not treat the matter as urgent, failed to log the report, forgot about the conversation and, in short, did nothing."

Mr Moore decided to take further action and phoned his boss, who put him through to the signal box at King's Cross.

But senior signalman David Castle "got the wrong end of the stick" and thought the fault was on the southbound track, rather than northbound. He sent engineers to check the wrong side, so they could not find a problem.

Half an hour earlier, commuter Peter Prime experienced "violent lurches" on the same track section. He asked a steward to tell a manager, but it was not followed up. Yesterday the inquest was told that after flipping into the air the carriage entered the station sideon, hitting a bridge. It then slid along the platform before grinding to a halt at a 45-degree angle.

All those who died were on the train except great-grandmother Mrs Quinlivan, who was on a pavement below the station and was hit by falling masonry.

Judge Baker said: "It was all over in seconds. It must have been a traumatic experience."

The Letchworth hearing, set to last three months, heard that driver Gordon Gibson had been cleared of any blame. Experts had concluded the "root cause" was loose track points with missing bolts.

Maintenance firm Jarvis, which went into administration in March, and Network Rail admitted liability. The hearing continues.

The victims Among the seven people killed in the crash were Austen Kark, former head of the BBC World Service, above, and, below, Taiwanese TV news journalists Chia Chin Wu and Chia Hsin Lin